Sam McAlister is the woman who secured the infamous Newsnight interview with Prince Andrew, when he claimed to Emily Maitlis that he was in a Pizza Express in Woking on the night Virginia Giuffre alleges he slept with her. The interview made headlines around the world and had a serious impact on the Royal Family.

McAlister was the first person in her family to go to university, and is a trained barrister, a single mother and a master of persuasion. In her former BBC colleagues’ words, she was the ‘booker extraordinaire’, responsible for many of Newsnight’s exclusives over the past decade, including Stormy Daniels, Sean Spicer, Steven Seagal and Julian Assange.

In August 2022 she came to Intelligence Squared to mark the publication of her new book Scoops: Behind the Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking Interviews. As well as describing her encounters with power and celebrity, she will explained how the best news gets made, the changes happening at the BBC, the future of mainstream media in the age of clickbait and the role of power and privilege in shaping our media landscape. And she shared her top tips for persuading people to do something for you – and reveal the negotiation skills she honed in order to produce some of the most unforgettable journalism of our times.

Praise for Scoops: Behind the Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking Interviews

‘Sam delivers where others fail. She has a zinger of a story to tell’ – Huw Edwards

‘Even though we know what happened, McAlister’s eye-witness description of the royal car-crash retains the power to shock… riveting.’ – Sunday Telegraph